


The Stars Between His Teeth

by Inky



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon Compliant: post S6, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, pining!Shiro, shiro is a big gay mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-18 10:21:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15483630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inky/pseuds/Inky
Summary: All he sees is Keith. Keith, who believes not only in himself, but in Shiro. Keith, who is hopelessly, irrevocably devoted to him. Keith, whose emotions are the edge of his blade rather than his downfall. Keith, who would rather fall into the end of the universe with Shiro than go on living without him.He smiles and it is beautiful and clean and perfect, like he holds the stars between his teeth.





	The Stars Between His Teeth

The elephant in the room is the size of a Balmera.

There’s really no need for this—all this dancing and beating around the bush. Keith isn’t _exactly_ avoiding him, but he certainly isn’t going out of his way to get into Shiro’s space, either. He's still checking in of course--but it's unconventional. Like he's tiptoeing.  _Maybe_ it’s wishful thinking. _Maybe_ he’s just being a nervous schoolboy about this, but Shiro thinks it’s because of the… interesting things Keith had said to Kuron, and now his fellow black paladin is nervous. Embarrassed, even.

Shiro had let it slip that Kuron’s memories had come back to him. He regrets it desperately. After he’s recovered enough to sit up for more than ten minutes at a time, he spills nearly everything to the Voltron team, save for a few key points here and there as to not underline how sick and awful he feels about all this.

 _Everyone_ feels sick and awful after everything they’ve lost. He’s not going to subject them to his petty insecurities. It helps to rationalize it that way, to dampen the darkness of what Kuron has done to his team. To Keith. In many ways, Kuron was a reflection of himself. He knows it is so because even in the midst of trying to murder his best friend, all he can hear and remember clearly is that beautiful, broken voice.

_Shiro, please._

_You’re my brother._

_I love you._

It spins and spins in his head in a horrible, _amazing_ , painful mantra. The desperation of it kills him. Keith’s love kills him.

And yet...

And yet.

It aches and brings him blooming warmth all at once. It’s a bittersweet feeling. It reminds him of a simpler (and still extremely complicated) time. Labored breathing, nursing a glowing alien wound... recovering from a crash into a hardpan surface he’s guessing was at twenty-five meters a second squared. Something like that.

_That really stuck with you, didn’t it?_

He remembers the soul-crushing weight of his realization. _He loved Keith._ He’d yearned for that voice, panting and grunting in his ear as Keith did whatever he had to do to make it to him in time. He’d saved Shiro, and it hadn’t been the first time, nor the last. Shiro knows damn well he wasn’t that subtle about his attraction towards Keith after that, but he’d tried his damndest.

Then Keith had to go and grow up without him.

Keith, who had once been maybe half Shiro’s height. Keith, whom he had taken under his wing in the short time before he launched for Kerberos. Keith, who had told Shiro he was like a brother to him—something Shiro could reluctantly _accept_ , if that’s what it meant to be close to him.

And then Keith went and just... _did_ that.

It isn’t fair. It makes something primal roar and rake its claws down the inside of Shiro’s ribcage when he thinks about it. When he sees how Keith’s grown so well into his armor and the way the starlight hits his hair, Shiro just can’t help himself. He doesn’t stand a chance against falling in love with Keith all over again.

He adores him. He’s hopelessly, _horribly_ devoted to Keith. Even with his memories reclaimed, he’s jealous of Kuron for being able to witness all of Keith’s growth in person.

And yet.

Twice, Keith had drawn his line. He interprets his love as brotherly affection. Shiro is okay with that. At least, he thinks he is. He’d resigned himself to spending the rest of his disappointingly short life within the consciousness of the Black Lion. He’d been grateful to be with Keith that way. Through the lion’s eyes, he could watch Keith become something more. Something beautiful and pure; an undying flame in that pilot’s chair. And though he had desperately, _desperately_ wanted to reach out and touch Keith’s shoulder one last time, he was okay with letting his spirit quietly fade away with his last moments being nothing but Keith.

And then Keith did _that_. He found him.

Allura had ripped his spirit from the cool conscious of his Lion and put it into that body. Kuron’s body. A body in pain. Broken. Hurting. Shiro had forgotten what it felt like to _physically_ hurt. In his sleep he’d wanted so badly to just let go, to perish just as he should have when Zarkon killed him in the first place. He had wanted back into the Lion’s mind, where his body didn’t have to ache on top of all of his trauma. He had just wanted to rest.

Keith had slammed his fist down on what was supposed to be Shiro’s casket. Begged him not to go in that sweet and terrible and wonderfully beautiful voice.

_Do it for Keith._

And now, a week later, they’re here, and they’ve yet to address this elephant the _actual_ size of a Balmera.

Shiro stirs himself out of his own thoughts, coming back to the present as he sits up in bed and peers out the port window into the awful, terrifying, empty void of the universe. They’ve docked on a remote station out in an quadrant Shiro can’t remember the name of. He’s dressed lightly—he spends most of his time still resting, so his clothes hang light and baggy off his skin. His body feels weak, like he’s carrying too much weight.

Eyes downcast, Shiro turns in bed and settles his bare feet down on the metal floor of his suite. It reminds him of the Castle of Lions and he’s hit with a pang of deep mourning for his home away from home, his refuge. There’s no one left waiting for him on Earth. Nothing to look forward to besides pain.

He doesn’t realize someone’s been knocking at the door until it slides open. Shiro blinks, perking up instantly. His heart screams for Keith, but his eyes register Krolia. He’s damn good at putting on a poker face, but apparently not fast enough. He manages an embarrassed smile as Krolia chuckles goodnaturedly at whatever expression he just made.

“I’m sorry I’m not Keith,” she apologizes, lifting her hands. “But hopefully I’m close enough. I wanted to check on you.”

Shiro has a sneaking suspicion Keith asked her to do this, but he doesn’t comment on it.

“How are you?” Krolia asks, coming into the room fully and letting the doors slide shut behind her. She pulls up a chair at the small table in the middle of the room. Trying not to grunt with the effort (damn, it makes him feel old and terminally ill all over again), Shiro gets up and joins her, sitting across from her and resting his one remaining arm on the table.

“Well, you know. Feeling better all the time,” he says dryly. The way she stares expectantly at him is so much like Keith that he almost wants to rip his heart out of his chest. He looks down. “Just... trying to lighten the mood.”

“...I know you remember me, and what I said to you. To... him,” she says quietly, her face somber as she brings up Kuron. “But I wanted to tell it to _you_ , Shiro. I wanted to thank _you_ for the things you’ve done for Keith. For making him the man he is today.”

She extends her hand to him. She wants him to take it, and Shiro swallows his hammering heart. Right... right. This is what this is to Keith; a mentor thing and nothing more. He stops himself from wearing whatever expression he’s about to make and puts on a smile, reaching out to briefly hold her forearm.

“If it’s all the same,” he starts. “Keith has always had it in him. I... can hardly... I can’t say I deserve your praise. After what I’ve done.”

Krolia releases him, watching his gaze fall.

“After what the clone did,” she corrects him and the comfort rings hollow. It’s never _just_ about Kuron. He still gives her a grateful little curve of his lips. She continues, “Keith just... you mean everything to him. He’s found a... kindred spirit in you.”

“A brother,” Shiro finishes her thought. He keeps his voice light, so it doesn’t sound like he’s resentful of it. And he’s not—really, he isn’t. It fills his heart with warmth knowing that he’s been so instrumental to Keith’s self-discovery. It just... he wishes it could be more.

“A kindred spirit,” Krolia reiterates. Shiro looks up at her sharply, catching the subtle shift in her voice and grasping onto it like a starved man. His mind whirs and he feels idiotic for sifting through those three simple words, a scholar poring over books in a language he can’t read. Krolia looks back at him, cool and collected. She looks just like Keith; from that piercing, fiery gaze to the swooping curve of her cheek.

It is so odd to see such a familiar facial structure looking at him like this. It makes him ache all over again.

“Anyways... it’s not like Keith to be so quiet,” Krolia goes on. Shiro feels himself swallow hard. Why is she talking about this? He presses his thumbnail into the meat of his palm and waits for her to continue. “He broods, but it’s not like him to keep things from me.”

“Is he keeping things from you?” Shiro asks before he can stop himself. Krolia side-eyes him curiously. A little smile appears on her lips. Just a little one.

“Two years isn’t nearly enough time to get to know him, even with the little glimpses into his past,” she says regretfully. “But it doesn’t take a genius to pick up how he handles his feelings. He still keeps a few things private.”

Shiro’s heart squeezes painfully, because he’s so used to Keith being over-the-top with his emotion. Sensitive and empathetic, his heart is open and raw for Shiro to see. The others always thought he was reserved, a loner, but not Shiro. Never Shiro. And now, not Krolia, either. He’s immensely thankful Keith had been able to grow and mature for two years with family. It’s a much better alternative than...

Than himself. Kuron or not.

“I’ve learned he sometimes needs a little push,” Krolia says. She lifts her shoulders in a shrug. “He gets that from me. Wearing his heart on his sleeve, though? Definitely his father.”

Shiro laughs, genuine but weak. “He’s a good man,” he agrees. “He really... he’s really rounded out into something special.”

Without thinking about it, he clenches his fist and frowns down at it, momentarily losing himself in thought without worrying about Krolia looking right at him. However, she doesn’t give him long to ponder, for she reaches across the table to set her hand over his.

“He needs you,” she says. It’s blunt, sincere. She doesn’t mince words. Her eyes carry so, so much meaning in them that Shiro feels the _something_ roaring and clawing at the inside of his chest again. Krolia searches his gaze and retracts her hand. “He needs a push.”

With that, she gets to her feet, smiling at him.

“I’m glad you’re doing well. I’m going to do a perimeter check on the base, I think...” she trails off, looking into the distance. It’s not just the whim of a haunted war veteran. She’s giving them time. Shiro clutches his fist so tight he feels like his nails will break the skin of his palm. Krolia just turns from him and goes to the door, settling her hand on the panel without opening it just yet. “Take care, Shiro.”

“...R-Right. See you later.”

-*-

Shiro spends an embarrassingly long time stalling, to the point that he’s sure Krolia will be back before he gets a chance to even talk to Keith. He worries his lip between his teeth as he stares at himself in the mirror panel on the wall. He gets the sense he’s trying way too hard, and with some embarrassment he folds his popped collar down properly. Overthinking is a heavy burden to bear, and the universe knows it. He tortures himself mentally with thoughts of Keith.

What is there even to say? Sorry for almost killing you as a clone? Sorry for permanently mutilating your face?

(That’s a little dramatic, even for him.)

Running his hand through his silver hair to tousle it a little, he stares at himself. He still looks weary, shoulders slumped. Heavy, dark circles hang under his dull eyes. It’s almost ghoulish. It’s nothing like Keith’s bright, burning flame and his proud, squared shoulders. He’s only a few years older than Keith but it might as well be a century.

“Pull. Yourself. Together,” Shiro murmurs to himself, but it’s said with the same cadence as _patience yields focus_. He runs his fingers through his hair again until the tuft at the front of his head sits the way he likes it. Resigning himself to looking a little worse for wear despite his preparation, he musters up all of his courage and leaves his suite.

The room where Krolia and Keith are staying (with the... wolf thing) is just down the metallic hall, past Pidge’s and Hunk’s rooms. Shiro stops at it, grimacing as he lifts his hand. He hesitates. It takes the amount of resolve to lop off his own arm (ha) to knock on the door. Feeling like a fool, he forces himself to rap three times on the metal.

“It’s open.”

Keith’s voice. Shiro hears it muffled through the door, and he could scream. The something in his chest expands until it feels like he could choke on his own lungs.

Touching the panel, Shiro opens the door. It slides open, revealing Keith in his bed, one knee up as he wipes at his Marmoran blade with a cloth. There’s something so quiet and concentrated about the way he does it. It makes Shiro’s heart flutter and ache, but he refuses to let it show on his face. The smile he wears feels forced, but he’s had enough practice to last a lifetime.

“Hey,” Shiro greets him. As the door slides shut behind him, Keith’s eyes widen and he straightens, his feet immediately on the floor as he sets his knife aside. He tenses like he’s going to stand. Shiro quickly lifts his hand to stop him, “You don’t have to get up.”

Keith stands anyway and Shiro tries to quell the stuttering of his breath. God, he’s gotten so tall. Without Shiro. He’s so, so bent out of shape over this. He feels like he hasn’t seen Keith in years. It reminds him of an old classmate who moved away and came back years later, void of his baby fat, angular, handsome. Hot as hell.

Shiro’s a mess. He doesn’t realize he’s been staring at the way Keith fills out his dark clothing until Keith clears his throat. Shiro’s eyes snap back up to his face and he smiles.

“Sorry, it’s... I’m still not used to seeing you like this. Outside of your paladin armor, I mean,” he admits. He’s gotta have a little honesty or Keith will see right through him. As it stands, Keith looks at him with that face—the one where he knows something’s up. But he doesn’t push. Doesn’t pry the way Shiro pries when he’s hypersensitive to someone’s mood.  Just looks. Expectant. He looks just like his mother.

“You’ve been through a lot,” Keith concedes. That look on his face softens and Shiro can breathe again. “Are... uh. You doing okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, never been better,” Shiro chuckles dryly. He looks off to the side. “I just... didn’t think I’d be able to look at you like this again.”

Shit.

“Look at _Voltron_. Everyone. With my real eyes,” he corrects hurriedly. “It was distant, watching from the Lion. Seeing all of you. I couldn’t have been more proud, but I wish I could have been there.”

“You were,” Keith assures him. Shiro’s heart stumbles over a beat. “You were there with us the whole time, Shiro.”

Keith is going to be the death of him. He imagines he’s looking at Keith with crazed, starving eyes; he knows the real expression on his face is normal, muted. A trained smile and a tired yet genuine crinkle of his eyes. Sincere, but missing something.

He steps forward, legs feeling automatic. He lifts his hand and settles it on Keith’s shoulder. It’s such a familiar, comforting gesture that it grounds him and stops the awful hammering of his heart against his chest. Keith crosses his arms and he has that little, attractive smile on his face that Shiro wants to steal with his lips.

“How’d you think I handled Black? Don’t think I was too hard on her, do you?” Keith asks slyly. His tone is joking but Shiro knows better. Shiro takes his hand off Keith’s shoulder, steps back, and puts it on his hip. His residual right arm tries to mimic the movement like there’s still a limb there and Shiro lowers it awkwardly. He recovers and grins down at Keith, chin tilted up a little bit.

“I don’t know, Keith— _were_ you hard on her?”

Something flashes in Keith’s eyes and his smile grows.

“She doesn’t handle like Red, but she’s solid. She flies real smooth,” Keith says. He moves his hand in a wave-like motion, like his hand is the Black Lion itself. “I think I almost flew her just as well as you.”

Shiro shakes his head and Keith’s smile falters a little, like he wants to be offended. Shiro’s hand is back on Keith’s shoulder before he can stop himself, and he squeezes.

“No. You flew her _better_. You stepped up, like a true leader. I’m proud of you, Keith.”

The look on Keith’s face is hard to decipher. He lights up at the praise, clearly, but his eyes tell an expanded story. Shiro wishes he could reach out and pluck it from him, like taking a star from the sky.

“Hey...” Keith trails off. Shiro blinks, wondering what he could have on his mind. He’s got that look on his face again as he looks down at his hand and scratches at a scab from a cut. Shiro wonders if Kuron... if _he_ put that one there, too.

“What’s up, Keith?” Shiro presses.

Keith looks back up at him, jaw set. “I was wondering if you wanted to get out of here,” he offers. “Uh... just us.”

“Uh... I—you mean, to the mess hall? Out of this room?”

“No. Off the station,” Keith says. The smile on his face is soft. Not shy, but perhaps a little sympathetic? “I’ve been thinking that maybe you might feel a bit… like you wanted to get out of here, so I thought we could leave for a while with Black.”

“Like old times, eh?” Shiro asks. The smile on his face widens a little and he has to remind himself not to look so overjoyed.

“Yeah. Just like that. Except... giant space lion cruising through space. Not hoverbikes through sand. Same thing, more or less.”

Shiro laughs and it feels like he’s blowing cobwebs out of his lungs. Keith chuckles quietly, too. For all of its complexities, this part of their relationship is easy. Kindred spirits, indeed.

“What do you say, old-timer?” Keith says, hands in his pockets as he passes and gently nudges Shiro with his elbow. “Hope you’re not tired of watching me fly.”

The old endearment brings Shiro suddenly and almost painfully to their past. Back then, Keith was young, not even a man yet. Nothing more than the kid Shiro wouldn’t give up on. If he told his past self that one day he’d look at the man Keith had become and fall in love with him, he would’ve laughed until he was blue in the face.

“I’ll never get tired of it, Keith.”

-*-

It’s strange not sitting in the pilot’s chair of the Black Lion. It’s stranger not to be literally uploaded into her consciousness, watching Keith fly her from a thousand different angles at once. It brings back some painful memories. He can still remember Keith’s broken voice, begging _please, no_ for the lion not to respond to his touch.

And yet here he is, proud and confident just how Shiro knew he could be.

Shiro wonders if Keith is embarrassed, now that he knows that Shiro could see him all this time, any time he was inside the Black Lion. Maybe he doesn’t realize the implications. Maybe he’s just too mature now to feel any shame from it. It nags at Shiro’s mind, but he doesn’t interrupt the peace for this.

Perched on the armrest of the pilot’s chair, he stares out into the starlight of the universe, stretched out into infinite, beautiful possibilities in front of them. Shiro doesn’t recognize the constellations at all, so it’ll never feel properly like home. It doesn’t bring him any discomfort, though. After all, Keith is right here.

The way Keith is piloting Black is... not timid exactly, but respectful. Different from how he usually pilots, like he’s a student driver. The meticulous way he handles the controls makes Shiro smile.

“You know,” he starts. He nudges the side of Keith’s head with an elbow. “I _know_ you fly her like a lunatic. Why hide it now?”

“I’m not a tryhard,” Keith snorts. “I’m not Lance.”

Shiro leans back a little and pulls up the leg nearest to Keith so he can cross his ankle over his knee. “Come on. Stretch out her wings, Keith. Let me see what you can do.”

“You _have_ seen what I can do. We’re just taking a cruise. I thought you’d want to relax and take it slow. You getting antsy?”

“Yeah, and I want to see how you can pilot her when the fate of the universe isn’t on your shoulders, for once.”

They glance at each other, trading a look that speaks a thousand words and more. Shiro’s heart pounds away against his ribcage, but that’s nothing new. His heart always races when it comes to Keith.

“Alright,” Keith says skeptically, grinning as he shifts gears. Black purrs as her engine core flares and hums in anticipation. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Keith guns it. Black takes off like a rocket, and Shiro is so used to watching this sort of thing through the Lion’s eyes that the sudden speed catches him off guard. He jerks, his ankle coming down from his knee to brace both feet on the floor. Without thinking, he grips Keith’s shoulder as the former Red Paladin leans forward. Keith’s grinning like it’s Christmas, rifling through space until the starlight stretches and warps around them. Shiro feels that familiar, pleasant pressure in his guts from their acceleration and can’t help but smile. He stands from the armrest to better brace himself, keeping his hand on the pilot’s chair to keep him steady.

Black flips and tumbles through space. Keith jumps her off of asteroids and chases comets, dousing Black in stardust and ice. He pulls off tricky maneuvers Shiro recognizes, and a few that he doesn’t. Keith’s showing off, now. For a moment, Shiro can almost picture that cocky kid back at the Garrison, getting in trouble just for being a little wild on the inside.

He’s laughing before he realizes it. It’s so, so healing; being here with Keith, watching him thrive. The free, endless expanse of space is right there in his palm, and Keith grabs it with the righteousness of a man denied this freedom his entire life. Shiro looks down at the back of his head, craning his neck to see his profile. Starlight dances over his cheeks. There’s no wind but his hair moves like he’s submerged in water, floating impossibly around his head. His eyes are distant and wide, unseeing and no longer present.

He’s connected to Black. He’s seeing through her eyes.

God, he’s gorgeous.

Shiro no longer watches the asteroid field they’re barreling through at a critically dangerous speed. Instead, he watches Keith. The universe lights up his face and in this moment he is ethereal and untouchable, like an angel. Shiro’s northern star in a galaxy far, far from the Milky Way. His heart aches for Keith and it’s such a tight, suffocating feeling that he can barely take it. It’s the sweetest sort of torture to watch him like this, inches away and yet so far.

He could never love a brother like this. He wants Keith. Just Keith. Shiro’s yearning shines brighter than any sun, any star, any light in the known universe. It’s blinding. It hurts.

_I love you._

Shiro feels it so deeply in his soul that he barely notices Keith’s expression change. His jaw goes slack and his pupils dilate, momentarily becoming slits as his eyes widen. The sclera yellows.

He clips an asteroid. Just on Black’s paw, but they’re going fast enough that it sends them into a violent tailspin. Shiro gasps and braces himself, practically throwing himself over Keith as they spin wildly out of control. Black’s back slams into an asteroid at full speed and it’s only her gravity stabilizers that keep both him and Keith from splitting their skulls open on the opposite wall. Black careens wildly through the asteroid field, pinballing against almost every rock. Keith yells, desperately trying to regain control of her, but the handles of her steering mechanism are jammed.

Finally, after what seems like a lifetime, they barrel out of the asteroid field and Black goes head-over-paws again and again. Her alarms are blaring, her panels flashing red. Keith yanks the right handle back, pulling hard and using up the last of the Lion’s power to blast the thrusters. Sweat drips down his face from the effort, until Shiro reaches out and grabs the handle, helping him pull.

Black slows to a stop. The thrusters sputter out and Shiro hears the whine of her engines powering down. The panels flicker and go dark. Slowly, he begins to feel weightless as the artificial gravity gives out. He floats upwards and so does Keith, who seems dazed from the crash. Shiro wonders what it’s like to crash while connected to the Lion.

“Keith,” Shiro says, startled to see Keith’s mostly limp form. That dazed, glazed-over look in his eye. Panic bubbles in his throat without him meaning it to. _Calm down_. “Keith!”

His voice is in control even if his heart isn’t. He kicks off the nearby wall and floats to Keith, grabbing him by the wrist.

“Keith. Keith,” he chants Keith’s name until he hears him groan. Keith blinks a few times to clear the haze in his eyes and looks around.

“Nnn... nnngh? What—“ he starts. His eyes widen in horror and he tenses in Shiro’s grip. “Black!”

“Keith! Calm down,” Shiro commands. He’s surprised at how easily his authoritative leader’s voice comes back to him. Keith instantly relaxes, trusting him implicitly, and looks at Shiro with knitted brows. There’s something strange going on with his expression that Shiro can’t put his finger on. “We’re okay. You’re okay. Black is fine—we might just need a tow. We need to wait for her to charge enough so we can send Allura a distress signal.”

“I... alright...” Keith trails off. “I-I guess…”

“What happened?” Shiro questions urgently. “You were fine one moment and then—Keith, you’ve never had problems with asteroid fields before. What happened out there?”

When Keith doesn’t answer right away, Shiro gives his wrist another jostle. It’s odd to be like this together, just floating in the cabin of the Black Lion. Maybe that is the reason Keith’s face is twisted so strangely, but Shiro has a sinking feeling in his gut anyway.

“Keith?” he asks. The authority in his voice is gone. Replaced only with his concern. All of his love, too. “Keith, talk to me. What happened?”

Keith looks at him sharply, with eyes wide and almost wild. He looks indignant for a second. Then resigned. Inquisitive. Curious. Maybe a little shocked. Like he’s seen a ghost.

“I heard you,” Keith finally whispers. Shiro stares blankly at him, uncomprehending. Keith looks down for a moment, lost in thought. But then he looks back up with a gaze so intense that Shiro can’t look away. “I heard you, Shiro.”

“Heard what?” Shiro asks in alarm. He wonders if Keith had hit his head when he wasn’t looking.

“I-In the Lion. When I was connected to Black. I heard you in my head, I heard—“ Keith splutters. He looks vulnerable. Like the insecure young man he’d been when they first came across the Castle of Lions, lifetimes ago.

“I don’t understand what you’re saying. I’m not in the Lion’s head anymore,” Shiro says gently. He releases Keith’s wrist, only to touch his head gingerly to check for lumps. Sighing, he pulls away from Keith and puts his hand on the pilot’s chair to try and pull himself to the dashboard. “I’m going to try and open comms to send out that signal. I think you’re hur—“

“ _Shiro_ ,” Keith grits out. He grabs Shiro’s shoulder, squeezing tight. There’s that voice again. That almost broken voice, laced with enough emotion to take Shiro’s breath away. He turns towards Keith again, and the beautiful heart Keith wears on his sleeve tells him everything before Keith even opens his mouth. “Y-You... I heard your voice. You told me you _loved_ me. _That_ kind of love.”

Shiro already knows. The concern melts away from his expression and is replaced by a sweeping look of resigned guilt. Releasing the pilot’s chair, he lets himself drift back to Keith and once more holds him by the wrist to keep himself in place. He can’t meet his gaze, for the first time unable to keep up the charade of an invulnerable, untouchable leader. For all of his strength, everything he’s been through, he is still just a man. A man who, despite trying with all of his might, is simply too weak to hold back his love for Keith any longer.

“I’m sorry,” he says. The silence of space is all-encompassing and choking. Together, in zero-G, they float together with nothing to hold onto but each other. Keith’s hand is wonderfully warm on his forearm. Shiro looks down, not letting himself get carried away in his own thoughts of Keith again. “I never wanted you to find out this way. I never wanted you to know at all.”

He shuts his eyes, unmasked agony all over his face.

“I know what you want from me is a brother figure. A family figure. A fath—“

He can’t say it. He doesn’t ever want Keith to think of him as a replacement for his father, but he’s so damn afraid that that’s what he truly feels. His shoulders slump in defeat.

“I know having Krolia in your life again won’t make those feelings magically change. But the truth is, I’ve... maybe in the _past_ , when you were just a cadet, I could’ve maybe been the ‘brotherly’ figure you wanted. But I can’t... I can’t look at you that way anymore. I’ve not seen you that way for a long time, Keith. I’m… I’m in.. in love with you.”

This is too painful. He feels a wave of resentment he doesn’t want to feel both towards himself and even towards Keith. Why did Keith want him back from the dead so badly? He has Krolia now—he _has_ family. Shiro’s spirit should have been left in the Black Lion to fade away, like a whisper in the wind. At least then he could’ve been happy watching Keith until Shiro disappeared forever.

Keith wouldn’t have to be placed in this awkward position, if not for him.

“If you need to distance yourself from me after this, I can do that. Anything you need. I respect you so damn much, Keith. You, your feelings, all of it. If you need me to step back, I will. As long as you need. I’ll be the brother figure you want me to be and nothing has to change. Just... I’m begging you, please don’t cut me out. I can’t—I can’t...”

His voice becomes small, vulnerable. It breaks and it makes Shiro’s guts flip over inside of him.

“...I don’t want to lose you. I love you more than... you’re my _everything_.”

Keith is so, so quiet. Shiro can’t stand it, but he can’t lift his head either. His hand is shaking against Keith’s wrist, still gripping tightly to it despite everything he’s just said. If only... if only he hadn’t been allowed his second—no, _third_ —chance at life. Living is just too painful. It’s too painful just to draw in breath.

“Shiro.”

Finally, Keith speaks, and Shiro isn’t ready for it. He ducks his head further, because his eyes are starting to sting and he can feel his throat seizing. Everything he’s held onto—all of the death, the pain, the loss, all of his grief—it comes bubbling up his chest.

Oh, god.

His tears gather in his eyes, but they don’t fall because there’s no gravity to pull them down. They bunch all together, forming a bubble of saltwater. He blinks hard; it’s impossible to see. The tears move out of his eyes and float near his cheeks. Big, ugly droplets all around him. It’s humiliating. Even worse, his gut wrenches at the thought of Keith thinking this is supposed to be some sort of manipulation tactic.

“Shiro...”

“I’m sorry. I’m _so_ sorry,” Shiro weeps. He can’t stop. He can’t stop thinking of every lightning bolt of pain through this worn body, he can’t stop thinking of every close call he’s had. He thinks of Kuron and everything he got to experience—things Shiro should’ve been there for. The awful things he said to Keith. Permanently leaving a nasty scar on his face. Nearly getting him killed. He’s nearly gotten _all_ of the paladins killed on multiple occasions. It’s all his fault.

All because this wretched body of his just can’t _stay_ dead.

Thick bubbles of tears float all around his face, shimmering in the starlight. Keith hasn’t let go of Shiro yet, just letting him crumble to pieces in his hands like a child. Shiro hasn’t cried in a long time. Not since the morning he found Adam’s engagement ring sitting on the kitchen table next to a neatly folded note.

He eventually calms, but he feels utterly defeated and alone. His grip loosens on Keith’s arm because he doesn’t think he should be in the pilot’s cabin anymore with him—he doesn’t want to confuse this man any more than he already has. But the silence stretches on, and Keith won’t let go of his damn wrist.

“Can you... can you please say something,” Shiro whispers hoarsely. He can’t help the bitterness in his tone. “Anything.”

“Not until you look at me.”

The authority in Keith’s tone shocks Shiro out of his pained stupor. He slowly raises his head, bumping one of the tear bubbles with his nose and sending it drifting towards Keith. The look on his face is just... warm, and accepting. His eyes shine brighter than Shiro has ever seen them.

All he sees is Keith. Keith, who believes not only in himself, but in Shiro. Keith, who is hopelessly, irrevocably devoted to him. Keith, whose emotions are the edge of his blade rather than his downfall. Keith, who would rather fall into the end of the universe with Shiro than go on living without him.

He smiles and it is beautiful and clean and perfect, like he holds the stars between his teeth.

Shiro could break down all over again, but Keith lifts his free hand to gently bat the tear bubbles out of their faces. They burst into millions of tiny droplets against his skin, dispersing into the cabin. Starlight reflects off of them and the air almost shimmers.

“It’s okay, Shiro,” he finally says. Shiro’s heart squeezes painfully tight. Keith’s looking at him with so much love that Shiro is helpless to do anything but just drink it in. He pinches his lips tightly together, the way he does when he’s trying to keep his mask in place. Keith’s hand comes towards him and he shudders when Keith slides his fingertips down his flushed cheek.

“You don’t have to fight it anymore.”

Keith takes the words Kuron had spat out so hatefully and twists them until they’re something beautiful, something pure. The irony is so sweet that it sucks the breath right out of Shiro’s lungs. Blood roars in his ears and he knows they’re blushing just as hard as the rest of his face. He tries to look down, but Keith lifts his face again.

That smile. His face. So full of confidence and self-assurance. He pulls himself forward, closer to Shiro. Even like this, drifting weightlessly in open space, they fall into each other’s gravitational pull. Together, they sink into it, into each other. Shiro gathers Keith into his arm and he’s nowhere near as small as he once was.

Arms curled up between their chests, Keith touches his fingertips to Shiro’s jaw and pulls his head down. Even though Shiro knows it’s coming, he lets Keith initiate everything just the way he needs it to be. He feels Keith’s lips, warm and pliant and maybe a little bit chapped, but it’s okay. Keith kisses him and it’s nothing like he dreamed their first kiss would be. He’s not fierce or fiery in the way he does it, but exceedingly gentle and soft. It’s simultaneously nothing and everything like him.

“You’re sure this is okay?” Shiro asks just for good measure when Keith finally pulls away—too soon—from him. He feels restless in his own skin, like he wants to do a hundred backflips. As it stands, they already are—they’re floating upside-down now, their legs up in the air and tangled together as they grip onto each other.

“Positive,” Keith confirms. He lets out a laugh that almost sounds giddy and Shiro’s love for him flares brighter than the sun. “I just... I thought you had someone waiting for you back on Earth, so I wasn’t really… letting myself hope.”

Blunt and honest. It’s such a comfort to him, knowing Keith isn’t going to leave him wondering. At least not intentionally.

“No. The only one who was waiting for me on Earth was you,” Shiro admits. Keith’s jaw slackens a little and he stares hard.

“So the reason you only invited me to the Kerberos launch—“

“Yeah.”

“Is that when you started to... to, uh, love me?”

Shiro blinks and lets out a bubbling laugh. He shakes his head. “No. Not—not like that. Not like I do now.”

Keith’s lips give a little curl. They’re still just drifting, spinning slowly like clockwork.

“When?” Keith whispers. Shiro can swear he feels his chest cracking. He never thought he’d have this conversation and the happiness he feels is so overwhelming that he can almost feel it leaking out of his ears. He’s shivering but he’s not cold, his teeth starting to chatter.

“I realized it when we crashed on that planet. The first time I told you I wanted you to lead Voltron.”

“Huh.”

“What?”

“It’s funny,” Keith starts. Shiro’s heart skips a beat. “That’s the first time I’ve ever wanted to kick your ass.”

It catches him off-guard and Shiro can’t suppress the laugh that bursts forth from his chest. Keith laughs with him, and together they shake and laugh and spin endlessly inside the head of the Black Lion. As their laughter quiets into silence, they touch their foreheads together and bask in their mutual feelings, realized.

“...When did you...?” Shiro whispers. Keith takes a long, long time to ponder.

“Just now, I think.”

Shiro jerks his head back, a momentary flutter of panic in his chest. Oh, god. If this is all some sort of sudden whim of his…

“Keith…”

“No, no. Listen. I think I’ve felt it for a long time, and I couldn’t place it right. I thought, as long as we could be close, I’d be okay. I thought you being like a brother would be enough of an excuse to be as close to you as I am.”

“...That’s why you’ve been calling it that?”

“Yeah. I think I knew, deep down. I didn’t want it to wreck what we had... or what you and Adam had. It was the closest I could be to you without making things weird.  So I just... convinced myself that was all it was. I believed it. Not anymore.”

“So we could’ve kissed a long time ago.”

“We’re idiots,” Keith agrees, snorting. He falls quiet again, gripping Shiro tighter and dancing two fingers up his left arm. Shiro gives an involuntary shudder. Then, Keith murmurs, “I’ve never kissed anyone before.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Could you tell?”

It’s a self-deprecating little question that has Shiro’s eyes creasing in utmost love for the man in his arms. He squeezes him.

“I don’t care. It was perfect. All of them will be.”

As if to prove his point, he pulls Keith in for another long, lingering kiss on his lips. He gently prods against Keith with the tip of his tongue and Keith startles a little in his arm, eyelashes fluttering. Shiro pulls away, grinning.

“I haven’t kissed anyone in a long, long time,” Shiro reassures Keith, who’s looking a little flustered. “I’m sure I’m rusty.”

“It was perfect,” Keith echoes Shiro’s earlier words and Shiro lets loose a sigh of content as he bumps their foreheads together. After a moment, “Shiro?”

“Yes?”

“When you... when you were in the Black Lion’s consciousness, what did you see?”

The question is unexpected and Shiro blinks. Instead of looking Keith in the eye, he just tucks Keith’s face up against his collar, fingers carding into his hair. It's getting long.

“Everything,” he whispers. It pains him just to recall it. “Watched you hate me for dropping the burden on your shoulders.”

“I never hated you. It just... it killed me, when you were away.”

“I know. I hated that I couldn’t do anything. I thought, if I controlled Black, helped you pilot her, it’d make it less hard.”

“...What do you mean?”

“You were struggling with the controls?” Shiro asks. He pulls back, shifting so he can cup Keith’s scarred cheek in his hand and touch it gingerly with his fingertips. Keith stares up at him with wide eyes.

“It was you?”

“I wanted to show you how to pilot her right,” Shiro admits. He shuts his eyes and inhales deeply. He smells Keith and it makes his heart swell. “I think part of me still thought of you as someone I needed to guide, or lead.”

He opens his eyes.

“I was wrong, Keith. You never needed my help piloting her. I let you take the reins fully when I realized I was doing nothing but holding you back.”

Keith shakes in Shiro’s arms and he tips his head forward, burying it back in Shiro’s collar. His arms scoop under Shiro’s, coming to rest gently upon his upper back. Keith’s hugs have always been so loose and uncharacteristically timid. Like it could all be ripped away from him in a single moment, in a blink of an eye.

There’s no reason for him to be afraid now. Shiro embraces him with all of his strength, and even with one arm he’s determined to make it clear that he’s not letting Keith go. He won’t push him away. Keith’s smaller body trembles with the pressure, his breathing a little labored. But it gives him the courage to tighten his arms around Shiro and convince _himself_ that he won’t be rejected.

“Keith,” Shiro murmurs. He loosens his grip to give Keith’s poor ribcage some space to breathe. Shutting his eyes, he tucks his face against Keith’s hair, just breathing it in. He just wants to say his name more. “Keith. Keith... say it to me again. Those words. Please? I want to hear them myself. Not just in a memory.”

Keith is silent for so long that Shiro wonders if he doesn’t know what he’s referring to.

“ _Keith_ ,” he whispers again, even lower, right up against Keith’s reddening ear.

“...I love you, Shiro,” comes Keith’s quiet reply. Now, without the danger of every breath being his last, he says it a little shyly, but behind the wavering of his beautiful voice, Shiro hears how sure he is of this. Of them. It’s more breathtaking than he could ever hope to describe.

“Again,” he exhales his words like they’re the sweetest smoke, a drug. He pulls his head back and so does Keith, who manages to look straight up at him. His gaze is intense, fiery. Though his cheeks are pink, he’s never believed in this—in himself—more than he does in this moment.

“I love you,” Keith repeats with more conviction. Shiro pulls him closer, closing in on him. Keith’s eyes are already falling shut in anticipation. “I _love_ y—“

Shiro kisses the life out of him.

Black slowly rotates in this endless, incredible, _wonderful_ universe. She faces the light of a nearby, splendid star. It’s almost as if a new morning dawns on the Black Lion, slowly rolling over her two passengers in a wash of brilliant light. The tear droplets still floating in the air send speckles of light into all the corners of the room.

Between their lips they birth a new star, hot and bright and passionate. Shiro licks into Keith’s mouth like a starved man, cupping the back of his neck with his hand and kissing him so hard that his neck bows dramatically to compensate. But Keith is right there, gripping tightly to the front of his shirt with knotted fists. He pushes right back. He comes alive like oil doused in flames. A ball of red-hot energy, ferocious like a forest fire and just as brutal.

He bites Shiro’s lip hard enough to startle him, his fumbling hands clawing down Shiro’s stomach until he reaches the belt on his pants. Shiro shakes, wanting this _so badly_ that the _something_ in his chest screams and threatens to break through his sternum. His last firing brain cells sputter and flicker out, and he submits easily to Keith’s movements.

However, Keith pauses just as he gets both of their belts open. Before he unbuttons their pants, he pulls off from their kiss with a wet _pop_. A string of saliva floats between them, wavering in zero-G. He’s panting harshly, cheeks flushed and his eyes shining. Shiro can’t hold back his smile, his entire body buzzing with adrenaline and lust and love. He’d die for this man.

No.

He’d _live_ for him.

“I want... I want to, uh,” Keith struggles. He steels himself and looks Shiro in the eye. “I want to touch you.”

“Then do it,” Shiro says. Simple. Affirming. “You can have anything you want from me.”

Keith attacks him again, this time with enough force for them to start drifting around in circles again, flipping literally head over heels in mid-air. Shiro does his best to keep up. What Keith lacks in experience, he more than enough makes up for with his passion and enthusiasm. His hands are rough, restless, and Shiro jolts a little as Keith shoves the fronts of their pants down.

Shiro focuses on holding them together with his one functioning arm. All this spinning around is disorienting him bit by bit, until he’s absolutely sure both him and Keith have magically phased through the walls of Black and are just careening through space. It’s exhilarating and frightening all at once, but he’s not afraid. Keith is here in his arm, touching him.

“Ouch,” he manages between harsh breaths, pulling away from Keith’s ferocious lips with a laugh. “Gentle, Keith. You don’t have to grapple me.”

“Sorry,” Keith huffs. He’s so breathless that his voice almost comes out as a gasp. It’s terribly endearing and Shiro feels that overwhelming happiness again, forcefully pushing down all of his worries. Keith is the only thing that matters.

Keith’s hands are clumsy, inexperienced, and feel more like he’s just trying to copy what he does in the privacy of his own bed. But Shiro doesn’t mind, groaning low into Keith’s ear and lavishing it with kisses. He likes the fumbling and the tugging, even if it makes him wince sometimes. They have time to learn.

He hopes, at the end of all of this, they’ll have the rest of their lives to learn.

“God, I love you, Keith,” he whispers hotly into Keith’s ear. It forces a strangled sound out of Keith, who pumps his hands faster. Shiro rocks his hips into his touch. “Mm. Just like that.”

Shiro’s encouragement drives Keith on faster. He’s sweating under Shiro’s arm around his shoulders, so he shifts his grasp a little lower down his back. Keith is making such beautiful, muted sounds that Shiro doesn’t dare try to moan louder than him, in fear that he won’t be able to hear him. He’s so quiet. It’s nothing like Shiro imagined. He thought Keith wouldn’t be shy about it, would cry out wantonly. This is even better. Every little sound he makes is precious to Shiro, and he commits them all to memory. _His_ memory. No one else’s.

He finishes first because Keith’s hand is fast and hard and Shiro’s not used to this. It’s not like Kuron touched himself. This body isn’t used to the sensation, and Shiro lets out a garbled, choked sound that makes Keith’s hand pause. Shiro pushes his hips into Keith’s hand until the throbbing stops.

“Shiro...” Keith sighs. There’s a little bit of a pleading tone in his voice. Keith shuts his eyes and pants, his hand still working quickly on his own erection.

“Keith. Stop, hold onto me,” Shiro breathes into his ear, emphasizing it with a kiss just below the lobe. Keith jolts almost violently, sucking in a sharp inhale. He obeys, lifting both hands to grab at Shiro’s shirt on either side of his ribcage.

Shiro reaches down between them and he can’t help the groan that falls from his lips. Keith is hard and wet and so, so hot. He tugs at a normal pace—but for Keith, who bucks his hips almost desperately into his hand, it’s agonizingly slow. Shiro pumps him a little harder, and chases his lips with fiercely passionate kisses that draws soft, guttural noises from the back of Keith’s throat.

“Relax,” Shiro murmurs to him as he pulls back. He watches the glassy expressions pass over Keith’s beautiful face. He watches the bright pink blush in his cheeks and the way his eyes glaze over. His lips are swollen and bright from kissing, and Shiro wonders if he looks the same. Messed up. Full of bliss and light and love.

“Shiro,” Keith pants, still quiet. His body is beginning to tense, and his hands grip Shiro’s shirt tighter, balling up the fabric in his clenched fists. His face pinches and it's so goddamn beautiful. “Sh— _iro_...!”

Keith shudders in complete silence when he finishes into Shiro’s hand. _So_ _messy_. Shiro sucks in a breath and fills his lungs with the heady smell of their frantic rut. It’s not the most glamorous of ways to touch each other for the first time, but Shiro wouldn’t trade it for anything. He gently coaxes it all out of Keith, until he’s jolting with overstimulation and trying to pull his hips away.

When they’re finished, Shiro loops his arm around Keith’s waist and Keith holds him around the neck. They float there in perfect, post-coital bliss. They bathe in starlight, and the moment is so soft and perfect that they don’t even mind the mess they’ve made. Shiro tries not to feel mortified that evidence of their little moment here is just floating around the cabin.

Distantly, Shiro hears the sound of Black’s commlink coming back online. Allura’s static-filled voice is on the other end, asking where they are and if they need help. It would be irresponsible of him not to answer. Right now, though, he’d trade all of the responsibility and lawful goodness in the universe for just one more uninterrupted moment here, stranded in the middle of the endless void with Keith.

There’s no one left waiting for him back on Earth. This life he lives is one full of pain. Sorrow. Endless loss and suffering. So much hurting, for no good reason. This life is full of cruelty, and yet despite being only a tiny speck in all of the known universe, he isn’t alone. Out of the trillions upon trillions of specks of cosmic dust, he’s found the speck of cosmic dust for _him_. His guiding light.

He’s never been more thankful for this wretched body of his.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my lovely beta readers, who helped smooth out my emotional sheith vomit and make it readable:
> 
> Nautilicious on [Tumblr](https://nautilicious.tumblr.com)
> 
> Kotaboda on [Tumblr](https://kotaboda.tumblr.com)
> 
> You can follow me here on [Tumblr](https://weavinide.tumblr.com) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/inkweaving).


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